Expert To Address Cycle Of Poverty

Some say poor blacks must do more to help themselves. Some say government must do more to help poor blacks. Eleanor Holmes Norton says both must occur

--and soon--if the cycle of black urban poverty is to be broken.

Norton is a law professor at Georgetown University and a nationally renowned expert on the subjects of race, affirmative action and the black family.

She also is the featured speaker at the Community Renewal Society`s annual benefit dinner to be held at 5 p.m. Tuesday in the Chicago Hilton and Towers, 720 S. Michigan Ave.

Norton said recently that she will expand on a widely circulated essay she wrote last year with historian John Hope Franklin. In the essay, the two argued that debate over black economic progress was being needlessly polarized between two schools of thought: those who blame the problems of lower-class blacks on blacks themselves and those who blame inaction by government.

``That`s an inflexible and artificial choice,`` said Norton, who served as chairwoman of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission under former President Jimmy Carter and before that as commissioner of human rights for New York City.

Rather than argue self-reliance versus government aid, Norton said, those battling urban poverty should try:

-- More emphasis on reviving old-time, family-oriented black values of the kind that sustained black communities in the days before the civil rights movement.

-- More self-help among blacks, especially middle-class blacks, who should ``reach back to the ghetto`` to help those still mired in poverty.

-- A reaffirmation of the government`s responsibilities toward the poor, coupled with a new menu of programs to fulfill that responsibility.

The Community Renewal Society is a 105-year-old urban mission agency affiliated with the United Church of Christ. Proceeds from the benefit dinner will go to a society program that helps the poor start their own business ventures.